Friday, May 22, 2009

My 11:00 was a migraine patient who refuses to take medications, or Botox, or do anything else I have to offer for her migraines. Fine, that's her decision.

Yet, she keeps coming back to me to complain about them!

So today she brought her mother to the appointment. After reviewing (yet again) all the commonly used migraine treatments, the patient again refused them.

So then Mom starts yelling at me! "You are incompetent! You are a fool! You should be able to fix my beautiful daughter's migraines! I see her suffering every day!"

When I pointed out that I'd offered several treatments for migraines, and her daughter had refused all of them, she got even angrier! "That has nothing to do with why she is suffering! You are trying to change the subject!"

Then they both got up and walked out. Mom said she's going to take beautiful daughter to see "a real doctor!".

It's like my mum - she has hay fever and most of the drugs are available OTC now. She won't try the ones I am on which work very well. Mum:- "I don't want to take too much medication". Me:- "My Doctor says you need them all to act all the areas that are affected by hayfever, and it's never done me any harm" Mum:-" No, I think I will start with one and see what it does". Me:- " It won't work, Mum". Mum:- " It seems too much"...what do you bet she'll still be moaning about it next week? ARGH!

dr grumpy wow, I am floored at the patient you see, the only experience I had was shadowing family practice residents and we had no where boffo/wacky stories that you've had. However, the customers I saw at pharmacies I worked in were just as wacked as the ones you've seen.

I don't get why the migaineuse won't try the triptin drugs - they are brilliant, and I remember the years before with tablets that didn't work or being told to take aspirin, which puts me into full blown allergic shock, or paracetamol (amph...I can't remember it's US name, sorry) when I was sick and writhed around all day eating the pillow and every noise and bit of light increased the pain. I have a US friend who takes sumitriptin by injection as she's sick as soon as it starts and in the UK, you can get melting wafers and tablets. Does this woman really have migraine, or does she just want to moan and have her mother do the same thing? I just don't understand either of them.

This is long after the fact, but although I could take Imitrex for my migranes (with aura, thank you very much), I choose to stick with Excedrin. The Imitrex does immediately eliminate the pain, much better than Excedrin, but it makes me feel very strange and the fuzzy feeling I have post-migraine seems to last longer.

Is it possible that for this patient the side effects are unacceptable to her?

Welcome to my whining!

This blog is entirely for entertainment purposes. All posts about patients may be fictional, or be my experience, or were submitted by a reader, or any combination of the above. Factual statements may or may not be accurate.

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